This was commuter country on the Erie Lackawanna Railroad, a tangled web of mainlines and branches upon branches that carried
thousands of commuters into and out of the New York area on trains of both the Erie and the Lackawanna, then the merged Erie
Lackawanna, succeeded by Conrail, and now operated by NJ Transit today. Here we will take a look at the Erie Lackawanna's
East End, which was and still is a very busy piece of railroad indeed. It was divided into the ERIE SIDE (Original New York
Division) and the DL side known as the Morris and Essex Division. Here is how they were composed:
ERIE SIDE
1.Main Line
2.Bergen County Line
3.Newark Branch
4.Northern Branch
5.Piermont Branch
6.NJ&NY Railroad (Pascack Valley Line)
7.Greenwood Lake Line
8.Montgomery Branch
9.Pine Bush Branch
10.Newburgh Branch
11.Crawford Branch
12. Orange Branch
13.NY&OW Branch
14.Graham Line
DLW SIDE
1.Morristown Line
2.Montclair Branch
3.Gladstone Branch
4.Boonton Line
5.Chester Branch(FSO)
6.Sussex Branch
7.Phillipsburg-Washington(FSO)=FREIGHT SERVICE ONLY.
8.Old Road (FSO)
Of these lines, the Morristown,Gladstone, and Montclair lines were electrified in the 1930s and reelectrified in 1984
with equipment replacement all around. Both the Erie side and DL side commuter lines now operate as NJ Transit's HOBOKEN DIVISION.
Prior to October 17,1960 the DL side was the Morris and Essex Division, while the Erie called its commuter lines its New York
Division. It wasn't until about 1963 that the merged railroad's New York Division became truly unified, thanks to the removal
of ex Erie trackage from downtown Passaic,NJ, and the juggling of pieces of the Newark Branch, ex DL&W Boonton Line and
splicing them into the balance of the Erie Main Line to create a reconstituted Main Line, which the line has been ever since.
Many of these lines began as shortline railroads themselves. The following is a partial family tree of each side of the New
York Division:
ERIE SIDE
1.Paterson & Ramapo
2.Northern Railway of New Jersey
3.Bergen County Railroad
4.Hudson and Paterson
5.New York and Greenwood Lake
6.Union RR
7.New Jersey and New York RR
DL&W SIDE
1.Morris and Essex Railroad
2.Sussex Railroad
3.Newark & Bloomfield RR
4.Passaic & Delaware
5.Warren Railroad
These last five were merged together to form the Lackawanna's Morris and Essex Division and early Erie Lackawanna employee
timetables for the New York Division continued to make reference to this division until late 1963 when the railroad restructured
its operating department, including reducing the number of divisions from 8 to 6. One project carried out by NJ Transit that
the Erie Lackawanna wanted to do, but did not have the money for, was the splicing of the Montclair Branch to the reconstituted
Boonton Line, thus creating the Montclair=Boonton Line referred to in public timetables by NJ Transit. Much of the New York
Division remains in operation today. However, trackage gone from this territory includes the following:
1.Sussex Branch
2.Caldwell Branch
3.Carlton Hill Spur
4.Newburgh Branch
5.Montgomery Branch
6.The Old Road
7.most of the Piermont Branch(original main line)
8.passenger main line between Newburgh Jct. and Middletown,rerouting the passenger trains to the Graham Line. Retired
railroaders from the Erie Lackawanna and both of its predecessor railroads will scarcely recognize the old New York Division
as it is now operated by NJ Transit on the passenger side and CSXT and Norfolk Southern on the freight side. True, local drills
still patrol the commuter lines for whatever freight traffic is still generated, but these are not as numerous as they once
were. Both the final Erie Lackawanna public timetables and the most recent NJ Transit issues can be found in the photo album.